


Shadowland

by TK_DuVeraun



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fade Fuckery, Mural paintings, Nightmares, Post-Trespasser, hey demons it's ya girl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-09-14 21:49:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16921026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TK_DuVeraun/pseuds/TK_DuVeraun
Summary: Former Inquisitor Lavellan is going to stop Fen'harel at any cost, but she plans to bring Solas to his senses instead. She won't let the murals they painted in Skyhold go to waste.All she has to do is find him.





	Shadowland

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Briarfox13](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Briarfox13/gifts).



> Zephyr Lavellan belongs to my friend Briarfox13! Happy holidays and congrats on winning my giveaway!

It was not an aravel. The wagon rocked and rattled, jostling and tossing the supplies with every rock and rivet in the road. But it was serviceable. It carried the supplies and tents used by Cassandra and the few other former Inquisition members that joined Zephyr on her hunt for the Dread Wolf. She would have been faster and quieter alone; with her wits and two horses, she could cover twice the ground as the wagon and her company. But as much as she needed to end things on her own terms, the value of comrades had been beaten and scarred into her flesh during the fight with Corypheus. And the ache in her missing left arm wouldn’t let her forget it.

So the wagon carried the gear during the day and housed her for the scant few hours she slept each night. With the others strategizing and chatting around the campfire, Zephyr painted the inner walls of wagon. Endless boughs that stretched from the floor, across the ceiling panels and back down the other side, twisted and gnarled branches that felt more like home than Clan Lavellan: she made murals completely her own. Though she saw Solas in the corner of her eye and felt his touch in every breeze, the paintings were hers alone.

Her hands were stained yellow and green from the tall grasses representing northern Orlais and Southern Tevinter. She smudged and smeared the excess paint onto her stump of an arm and narrowed her eyes at the harsh lines of the white wolf. The silent hunter, misplaced and carrying secrets to places they should never go. She’d initially balked at the Keeper’s idea of what animal represented her. She was Dirthamen’s chosen; not a supplicant of Fen’harel.

But the Creators were like so much burned food. Once they could have brought life and fulfillment, but now they gave little more than ash and bitter taste. Zephyr would find Solas and turn him from his plan, turn him to teaching the People their history, to correcting the lies and propaganda. To helping them shove off Tevinter and Orlais’ boots for good. Her eyes burned as she spread the teal paint on the wolf’s face. Every night she searched the Fade for him. She understood now: knew how to explain to Solas, how to make him see from her perspective. If she could only find him, Fen’harel could be the freedom-bringer he remembered being.

A breeze brushed against her skin and rustled the grasses painted on wood. They’d spent days in the Fades, exploring and learning, each night that they’d lain together. There was magic in history, in the mundanities lost to time and Zephyr ached to discover them again. The white wolf howled at the blank wood and the grasses snagged and pulled on Zephyr’s armor. Her arms reached back for her bow before she froze, held in an icy grip that wasn’t entirely fear; Fear was also paying her visit.

Zephyr fought and drew her bow, sweeping her aim across the field. “He’s not with me, Demon!”

Throaty, inhuman laughter sent spears of fire into her ears. Zephyr neither cringed nor lowered her bow. The wind picked up until it was a roiling gale, whipping her hair into her face and tearing at her bare cheeks. The grasses bent and bowed under the onslaught, like the Inquisitions soldiers that fought on her orders before dying on their knees. Fire tore across the landscape, howling as it devoured the very air.

“His rage is not mine!” Zephyr shouted, the force of will in her voice drowning out the wailing of wind and fire.

 _What if it is yours I want?_ The words were cloying, but sickeningly sweet: sugar and oil congealing into inedible slag.

Her boot raised from ash and stepped onto old, crumbling stone. The Silent Tower spread before her, the rest of the ruins behind. Bow still in hand, She stepped forward. The path was as familiar as Skyhold, though she’d been there only once and with Qunari harrying her steps. Zephyr’s breath fogged in the air as she stood before the mural of Solas removing vallaslin. Skin aching with emptiness, she turned her back on it.

“I am no mage. I’m no use to you.” She feared neither demon nor spirit, not after ages spent traveling the Fade with Solas to teach her its wiles.

 _Where is your pride now?_ The whisper struck her face hard enough to force a flinch.

Zephyr raised her chin, looking down at the demons she couldn’t see. “Gone, but I’ll find him before you do.”

 _Sil-ly lit-tle mor-tal._ Each syllable crashed against the ground like so much broken glass. _Your pride was stripped from your face!_

Zephyr screamed as the nightmare went black, but turned it into a defiant howl before gasping for breath. The ice runes on her arrowhead glowed before the blackness receded and she found herself on the top of the Silent Tower, overlooking the Dales as they burned again, fire dripping from the sky as the Veil fell. The muscles in her jaw tightened. “I made my choice. I make my choices, not the _shems,_ not Fen’harel!”

_He left you a child; alone in the woods. Helpless._

Trees burst from the stone on either side of her. Zephyr nocked her arrow and drew her bow. “Not helpless. Never again. I have his secrets. I will stop him.”

 _Secrets never brought you love before._ The demons spoke as a wretched chorus; their words felt more than heard. _Neither shall they now._ The last syllable shattered the stone beneath her feet and Zephyr fell, firing her arrow into the sky as she did.

Her back hit hard wood, knocking the breath from her lungs. She sat up in a rush, pressing her hands to the wagon’s walls to stay upright. The painted grass under her palms was charred. Above them, the tower loomed. Where once her avatar, her white wolf, stood, was a beast blackened with ash. Embers drifted over its face like so many red eyes.

Zephyr dug her nails into the paint and scratched off thick chunks. “Impossible. No, this can’t be. Who did this? _Who did this?_ ”

 


End file.
